Hafsah

Meaning of Hafsah

Rooted in the classical Arabic verb hafasa (“to collect” or “to gather”) and conventionally interpreted as “young lioness,” the feminine name Hafsah has held significance in Islamic history through its most illustrious bearer, Hafsah bint Umar, one of the Prophet Muhammad’s wives and the inaugural custodian of the written Qur’anic text. Transcribed in English as HAHF-sah (/ˈhæf.sə/), it emerges in the United States Social Security Administration’s records for female births from the late 1990s onward, exhibiting a gradual increase in adoption: from five occurrences in 1997 (rank 862) to forty-three occurrences in 2024 (rank 907), punctuated by slight oscillations in annual rank yet maintaining a presence within the national top thousand. This pattern of sustained, moderate growth suggests a measured receptivity among Anglo-American parents to names of Arabic provenance that embody both historical gravitas and semantic associations with strength and guardianship, thereby securing Hafsah’s place within a contemporary naming repertoire that values cultural depth and scholarly resonance.